2010 /
bronze with gold plating; stands: wood /
Variable Dimensions /
Ai Weiwei’s Circle of Animals / Zodiac Heads, a re-envisioning of the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac, reaches back to a dark episode in China’s relationship with the West: the Second Opium War, and the destruction by Western troops of the Yuanming Yuan (The Old Summer Palace in Beijing) in 1860. The work raises issues of international looting, the nature of cultural patrimony as well as contemporary China’s relation to its own history.”
